The Lumberjack Feedback – The Stronghold
Release Date: 26th April 2024
Label: Argonauta Records
Bandcamp
Genre: Post-Metal, Instrumental.
FFO: Cult of Luna, The Ocean Collective, Russian Circles.
Review By: Andy Spoon
French instrumentalist post-metal outfit The Lumberjack Feedback are poised to release their 5-track epic EP/LP, The Stronghold. It’s technically only 5 tracks, but most are over 6-minutes in length, making it play longer than most EPs. I like to think it’s some sort of hybrid between the two. The double-drummer band’s grasp on heavy melody with a wide soundstage that blends fuzzy post-metal with the fluttery beauty of post-rock in a package set to deliver a really entertaining overall sonic message. This is absolutely a band to check out if you like stereophonic experience and volume dynamics, as the band has put more than enough thought into the music presentation.
Right off the bat, I quickly identified Cult of Luna vibes in the deep, bass-y melody. Fans of COL will really enjoy the guitar and bass work on The Stronghold. There’s an overall “heaviness” in the atmosphere that is not just slow and dirge-y, but exceptionally-rhythmic and groovy. One of the band’s unique features is that they have two drummers, something that you might need to actually see to notice. However, once you know that fact, you might enjoy trying to hear the split in the tracks where each percussionist makes their own way. The overall effect is the extreme heaviness of the drum tracking. However, I noticed that The Lumberjack Feedback didn’t have any featured moments where it was clear to me that they were exercising the expanded sound of two drummers, at least to my untrained ears. Could it just be a gimmick? Perhaps, but it didn’t affect much of the listening experience for me. I just found it to be a cool “jeopardy” trivia knowledge fact about the band. I certainly do recommend watching their music videos, as it brings a cool effect to the overall visual presentation.
The drums rely on use of the toms and big cymbal crashes to accent the tracks. There’s an absence of a constant backbeat, which helps build a soundstage for the band’s overall tone. I think that there’s quite a bit of the tribal and ethnic tone to the use of the toms across all the tracks. This harkens back to the Cult of Luna comparison. When bands do this, there is often a focus on musicality rather than groove, which can assist in building atmosphere, something that The Lumberjack Feedback obviously prioritizes, as it pervades the entire album.
One of the things that I noticed is that each track really likes to follow that specific “hairy” heavy feeling through the guitar and bass usage. There is a great flow between fast and slow parts of each track. I absolutely dig the flavors that The Lumberjack Feedback tends to bring out in certain parts of the tracks, namely in But All Remembered the Place, a track which has an excellent swinging structure that goes between memorable hooks and tribal build-ups into epic crescendos. I think that while the EP is only 5 tracks, it feels much longer, as many of the tracks are over 6 minutes long. Overall, I give this album a 4 out of 5 because I really wanted to spin it multiple times and dive into the nuance of each track. I think that The Lumberjack Feedback fits nicely in the post-metal genre and has a lot to offer fans. I would recommend that anyone who’s a fan of Cult of Luna or Russian Circles check this out. Further, I think that I would also recommend this to Sleep Token fans, as there is a heaviness in the melody that tends to follow the dramatics of those bands.
(4 / 5)
